Relations Of The Portal System And Esophageal Collateral Hemodynamics And Plasma Endothelin

Objects With color Doppler sonography, Endoscopic ultrasonography and noninvasive esophageal variceal pressure measurement device, we investigated the hemodynamic changes in a group of patients with liver cirrhosis and tried to explore the relationship between the changes and levels of plasma endothelin.Materials and methods A total of 32 patients with liver cirrhosis and 20 healthy controls were studied in which portal hemodynamic indices, plasma endothelin, diameter and pressure of esophageal varices were measured with the effort to analyze their changes and relation.Results We found hyperdynamic state in portal system and elevated level of plasma endothelin in cirrhotic patients, higher in variceal subjects than the non-variceal. Endothelin positively correlated with diameters of portal and splenic veins while there was no significant correlation from flow quantity of portal and splenic veins. We also found level of plasma endothelin correlated positively with diameter and pressure of esophageal varices.Conclusion Plasma endothelin may participates in the development of portal hyperdynamic circulation in cirrhosis and may play an important effect on portal hypertension and esophageal varices through influencing the pressure of portal collaterals.